I’m prison gardener so I can be trusted on early release, violent raider tells High Court
A MASKED raider who terrorised a businessman’s family in their home before stealing jewellery worth up to €100,000 has asked for early release because he has become ‘the prison gardener’ and can now be trusted.
Brian McGinley, 44, told the High Court he is a model prisoner and has been working responsibly as a gardener and cleaner at Castlerea Prison. He is there serving a tenyear sentence for the prolonged aggravated burglary.
The married father-of-six – who pleaded not guilty when he stood trial but now admits he was involved – was sentenced in December 2010 and would be due for release by midway through next year at the latest.
He launched a High Court action against Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan yesterday seeking ‘enhanced’ remission that would ensure he is out of prison for good by Christmas.
His barristers Seamus Clarke and Karl Monahan also asked Judge Richard Humphreys to grant him immediate release on bail pending the outcome of his case – on the basis that he feels bad about his crime and has since attended a number of educational courses behind bars and become a ‘trusted’ jail inmate.
Gardaí and the State are objecting to the bail request. The State has so far refused to guarantee him early release due to the ‘potential threat to the safety and security of the public’.
State lawyers pointed out that in some cases, ‘no amount of computer courses or first aid courses could mitigate that risk to the public’.
The court heard that McGinley has already written directly to the Justice Minister’s officials to express his ‘remorse’ for the offence and to request early release.
On February 13, 2005, a four-man masked gang armed with iron bars and a hammer entered the rural Co. Westmeath home of wellknown businessman Damien Kilmartin by a back door.
They threatened to rape Mr Kilmartin when there was a delay getting a safe open, the court heard. The family’s ordeal was said to have continued for over two hours and the gang fled the scene in Mrs Kilmartin’s 4x4. McGinley lost an initial appeal against his sentence in 2013.
From the witness box yesterday, he denied personally threatening to rape anyone during the raid, although he acknowledged that such a threat was made.
Three boys aged 14 and under and their first cousin – a young girl who was visiting the house – were shut inside a bathroom during the raid.
Dressed in a grey sports jacket with a purple handkerchief sticking out of his breast pocket, McGinley yesterday denied that a carving knife found by the raiders in the house was put to the throat of one of the children. He said: ‘It was put to nobody’s neck.’
The court heard that at least one male family member was tied up during the raid, but not Mr Kilmartin’s wife or children.
McGinley told the judge that he is already on an ‘enhanced’ regime in prison. He said: ‘You get better conditions in prison, a bit more freedom… I’m a trusted prisoner. You get an extra phonecall a day, better visiting times, you get a lot of different things.’
He said he is the prison’s gardener and he also cleans the prison chapel and all its grounds.
However, he admitted to striking anotherhe hit me prisonerfirst’. in 2013 ‘because
McGinley said he wrote to Minister Flanagan earlier this year and ‘said I was remorseful for the offence, I have family myself and I can understand the trauma.’
Barrister John P Gallagher, for the State, pointed out that McGinley had originally denied his involvement in the ‘extremely violent criminal offence’ at trial. He argued ‘denying the offence is anathema to rehabilitation’. He added that the prisoner had denied involvement in the crime ‘up to the point where he writes to the Minister [in February of this year] seeking enhanced remission’. Judge Humphreys said he needed time to consider the case properly before giving his judgment but that he will do so in the next fortnight. McGinley sat at the back of the court with his arm around his wife. Prison officers monitored him closely, when he wasn’t giving evidence. He was driven back to Castlerea Prison from Dublin’s Four Courts in a prison van at 4.20pm.
Victim threatened with rape